Fallout 3, Fallout 4, and the forthcoming Fallout 76 all to feature, with all proceeds going to the charity

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Bethesda is teaming up with charity War Child to put on the somewhat lengthily-named ‘War Child UK Presents Bethesda Game Studios in Concert’ later this year. The event will feature music primarily from the Fallout series, including music from Fallout 76, just a couple of weeks before its release.

The concert will be held at the London Eventim Apollo, Hammersmith on Saturday, 3rd November, and tickets go on sale from tomorrow, starting at £45. All proceeds from ticket sales for the show will go to the charity.

Bethesda commented that it “is excited to be working with War Child UK on the concert, an organisation that strives for a world where children’s lives are no longer torn apart by war.”

Inon Zur, the Fallout composer will be attending the event and there will be meet-and-greet tickets available, along with exclusive merchandise and even a page from the score signed by him.

The involvement of the composer is well-considered, after the last concert Bethesda put on was somewhat tarnished by Skyrim composer Jeremy Soule speaking out against the event, saying: "For the record, this concert has nothing to do with me, nor are they are using any of my original scores. They had to transcribe whatever notation they are performing by ear from the recordings. This is a flawed process as transcriptions are always fraught with errors.”

Soule’s music will again feature at this concert, with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim also on the playlist. We’ve reached out to Soule for comment but haven’t yet received any confirmation of his involvement.

For more details and general ticket sales, visit www.metropolismusic.com. Fallout 76 launches on the 14th of November on Xbox One, PS4 and PC.

Bethesda has teamed up with subscription commerce platform Loot Crate to create a bi-monthly Fallout-themed crate, the publisher has announced. Pre-orders open today at 6.30pm UK time, and is the first create to feature an exclusive Fallout figure line and other Vault-Tec themed gear. The first crate will focus on Vault-Tec, and will celebrate the …

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Bethesda has teamed up with subscription commerce platform Loot Crate to create a bi-monthly Fallout-themed crate, the publisher has announced.

Pre-orders open today at 6.30pm UK time, and is the first create to feature an exclusive Fallout figure line and other Vault-Tec themed gear. The first crate will focus on Vault-Tec, and will celebrate the experience and experiments of everyday vault living beneath the Wasteland.

Priced at $49.99 plus shipping and handling for international buyers, each crate will include 4-6 exclusively licensed items across apparel, gear and other collectible items valued at over $65. Each one will also feature an iconic companion from the Fallout series, the first of which will be Fawkes from Fallout 3. Furthermore, each crate will include pieces of a power armour set that will buyers will be able to assemble from crate to crate.

A year’s bundle is also available to pre-order, and those that choose this option will get an exclusive bonus item in the form of a mini-nuke USB hub.

Founded in 2012, Loot Crate is a leading subscription commerce platform targeting super fans of entertainment franchises, working with major studios, games companies, comic publishers, professional sports leagues and personalities to curate premium and exclusive consumer products in themed mystery boxes that are delivered directly to subscribers’ doorsteps.

Fallout 4 developer Bethesda has introduced new measures to the game’s modding support in order to stamp out piracy.

Both the PC and Xbox One versions of the RPG allow players to create and share mods, with PS4 compatibility close to a beta release.

Following the launch of modding for Xbox One in May, a number of PC creators complained that console players were taking their mods and releasing them wholesale on console as their own work.

In response, Bethesda created a path for authors to register DMCA takedown requests if they felt their work had been plagiarised on Xbox One.

Now the studio has taken another step towards eradicating mod piracy, by requiring that console players link their account for Bethesda’s mod platform to a Steam account before being allowed to upload mods.

Bethesda is to take its first steps into the world of virtual reality with new versions of two of its most recent hits.

A VR edition of Fallout 4 will be released for the HTC Vive headset next year, with Doom following at an unannounced date.

No further VR platforms were said to be supported – potentially a result of the legal clash between Bethesda owner Zenimax and Oculus parent Facebook, with the former claiming that the latter infringed upon its IP by making use of code written by current Oculus exec John Carmack while he was still employed at Zenimax.

Fallout 4 game director Todd Howard pledged to bring the entirety of the epic post-apocalyptic RPG to virtual reality.

“Let’s not make a short version of Fallout 4; the promise is the whole game," he vowed.

Obsidian Entertainment is now the home to two of the guiding forces behind the original Fallout.

Leonard Boyarsky is perhaps best known as the art director who introduced Fallout’s iconic Vault Boy icons while working at Interplay Entertainment in the mid-1990s.

He later left to form Vampire: The Masquerade – Bloodlines developer Troika Games with fellow Fallout creative Tim Cain, who is now also at Obsidian.

For the last decade, Boyarsky has been at Blizzard, working as lead world designer on RPG Diablo III.

He confirmed his move to Obsidian in a Facebook post, while Cain uploaded a picture of the pair reunited at the developer’s office, joking: “New co-worker. Hope he doesn’t talk too much.” (via RPG Codex)

As well as RPGs South Park: The Stick of Truth and Pillars of Eternity, Obsidian also created 2010’s Fallout: New Vegas.

]]>Bethesda: We use internal game jams to create Fallout and Elder Scrolls DLChttps://mcvuk.com/bethesda-we-use-internal-game-jams-to-create-fallout-and-elder-scrolls-dlc/
Wed, 24 Feb 2016 09:44:00 +0000https://mcvuk.com/bethesda-we-use-internal-game-jams-to-create-fallout-and-elder-scrolls-dlc/'When we've finished our vertical slice preproduction build, we do one for a week then. We do another at the end, which is focused on mining ideas for DLC.']]>

The game director for Fallout 4 has offered a little insight into the development methods used to create the epic RPG.

Speaking on the subject of DLC to Game Informer, Todd Howard revealed that involving the game’s team in sessions dedicated to bursts of creativity – such as game jams – was key to concepting add-on content for both the Fallout and Elder Scrolls games.

“We do that every game,” he said. “We do that in the middle of development. So we did that in the middle of Fallout 4.

“When we’ve finished what we call our vertical slice preproduction build – when you can actually play the game – we do one for a week then. That fuels features for the main game like jetpacks and a number of other things. And we do another at the end, which is focused on mining ideas for DLC.

“We kind of talk about stuff, but when we start to see it on screen, we say: ‘That’s really good. Here are the things we can do. What’s going to be in an update? Hey, these fit in a package.’”

Howard also touched upon the recent announcement that Bethesda Game Studios would work across multiple titles for the first time since 2002, as well as the studio’s recently founded office in Montreal, which will focus on mobile spin-offs of its core franchises.

“We’ve always kind of overlapped stuff, but I guess we’re doing more now than we ever have,” he commented. “[The projects] aren’t all the same scale, but they are longer-term. We’re also doing DLC and Fallout Shelter, creation kit and mod stuff, updating the game – we’ve got a lot going on.

"We got to the point with the studio in Montreal where we can start expanding. We thought that: ‘Hey, these are things we talked about doing, so why not? Let’s start.’”

]]>Bethesda changes up single-title dev cycle to work across three ‘big and crazy’ projectshttps://mcvuk.com/bethesda-changes-up-single-title-dev-cycle-to-work-across-three-big-and-crazy-projects/
Fri, 19 Feb 2016 09:44:00 +0000https://mcvuk.com/bethesda-changes-up-single-title-dev-cycle-to-work-across-three-big-and-crazy-projects/‘They're different than anything we've done before,’ Todd Howard teases, while revealing that new studio in Montreal will focus on mobile]]>

For the first time in more than a decade, Bethesda Game Studios is to develop multiple games simultaneously.

The Fallout and Elder Scrolls outlet has stuck to a one-game cycle since 2002, dedicating its entire workforce to titles including Skyrim and Fallout 4.

After Fallout 4’s upcoming trio of DLC add-ons is finished up, however, the studio will be expanding its output to include multiple projects.

"We have three longer-term projects we’re doing that are all… we’ll talk about them at a much future date," game director Todd Howard revealed on-stage at this year’s DICE summit.

"They’re different than anything we’ve done before, while also being a Bethesda-style game: big and crazy. In many ways, different than things we’ve done before."

Howard also discussed the future of Bethesda’s newly-opened studio in Montreal, saying that the team would be working on mobile titles such as last year’s Fallout Shelter and the upcoming Elder Scrolls card game, plus “other things”.

Prodded further about the possibility of Fallout 5 (despite there being a seven-year gap between the last two instalments), Howard simply laughed.

The man behind The Elder Scrolls and Fallout is to be recognised for his contribution to the games industry.

Todd Howard, who has served as creative director, designer and executive producer for a number of major titles during his 22-year tenure at Bethesda, will be awarded with the Lifetime Achievement prize at this year’s Game Developers Choice Awards.

The celebration takes place during GDC 2016 at the Moscone Convention Centre on March 16th and will be hosted by Funomena co-founder and game designer Robin Hunicke.

Howard created the first mouse-look 3D shooter, The Terminator: Future Shock, on PC two decades ago, before moving onto The Elder Scrolls franchise and creating beloved entry Morrowind in 2002, plus critical and commercial smash hit Skyrim in 2011.

Following that, Howard led the team behind equally revered open-world RPG Fallout 3, as well as that behind last year’s follow-up, Fallout 4. He also directed Bethesda’s first mobile game: spin-off Fallout Shelter.